It's definitely a darker, more boldly dystopian world than anything he's ever done; something of a departure from the oft-stereotyped poppy pastel stylization of his past films. The futuristic setting here also stands in contrast to the nostalgia that permeates much of his work. Glad to see he's continuing to challenge himself within the confines of his style, adapting it to the Academy ratio in Budapest and here with another foray into stop-motion.

The blankness of the backgrounds in some of the shots of the island reminded me a bit of Isao Takahata's animation style with its stark, "unfinished" sketches, which also might contribute to that "rough around the edges" feeling.

This is stupid of me, and it's probably too tenuous to actually be a reference, but when the female character talks about the boy stealing a "Junior turbo prop XJ-750..." I couldn't help but think of the song "Sy Borg" on Frank Zappa's album "Joe's Garage." The police arrest Joe because he has destroyed a "model XQJ-37 nuclear powered pan-sexual roto-plooker." Again: tenuous at best. But the X and the J in the model number sparked a connection in my one-track Zappa mind.

[Miyazaki] brings the detail and also the silences I think... With Miyazaki you get nature and you get moments of peace, a kind of rhythm that is not in the American animation tradition so much. That inspired us quite a lot. There were times when I worked with [composer] Alexandre Desplat on the score and we found many places where we had to pull back from what we were doing musically because the movie wanted to be quiet. That came from Miyazaki.

Reviews I'm seeing out of Berlinale have all been really good. The impression being that Anderson has crafted a great (And very Pro-Dog) film. A quick Google search should bring up some of the impressions/reviews.

Perhaps Anderson developed this film partly in response to critics who accused him—after the fate of Snoopy in Moonrise Kingdom and the rather unflattering portrayal of the guard dogs in Fantastic Mr. Fox, etc.—of being anti-dog.

whaleallright wrote:Perhaps Anderson developed this film partly in response to critics who accused him—after the fate of Snoopy in Moonrise Kingdom and the rather unflattering portrayal of the guard dogs in Fantastic Mr. Fox, etc.—of being anti-dog.

whaleallright wrote:Perhaps Anderson developed this film partly in response to critics who accused him—after the fate of Snoopy in Moonrise Kingdom and the rather unflattering portrayal of the guard dogs in Fantastic Mr. Fox, etc.—of being anti-dog.

whaleallright wrote:Perhaps Anderson developed this film partly in response to critics who accused him—after the fate of Snoopy in Moonrise Kingdom and the rather unflattering portrayal of the guard dogs in Fantastic Mr. Fox, etc.—of being anti-dog.

Just in case anyone (like me!) ignored this the first time you were passing by because you assumed it was just standard EPK stuff, I want to point out that it's really a (delightful) short film in which each cast member's interview segment is animated as their character. Fox Searchlight also released a really cool 360° behind the scenes version where you can look around the room and see the animators' process in timelapse.